The imposing medieval castle of Bolsena overlooks Lake Bolsena, the largest volcanic lake in Europe. The lake was a volcano about 300,000 years ago, its shores were settled probably in the Neolithic…
Read Article
Bolsena celebrates in floral splendor the Feast of Corpus Domini, for after all, this feast promulgated in the 13th-century – and also known as “Corpus Christi” – originates with a miracle here…
As I recently entered the gate leading into the cloister of the 11th-century Church of San Giacomo de Muro Rupto (St. James in the Broken Wall), I noted the sign indicating the…
Due to cataracts, Signor Vittorio – age eighty-two – doesn’t have a needle in his hands to embroider these days. When I met him recently near the Assisi souvenir kiosk of his…
“There isn’t a day that I don’t have a needle in my hand,” Antonietta told me as we talked about her passione for the embroidery of the punto Assisi (the Assisi stitch). She grew up…
As a child growing up in Assisi, craftsman of medieval stringed instruments, Luca Piccioni, would have been familiar with such instruments from an early age. School trips in elementary school would have…
The creative output of many Assisi artisans is owed to the inspiration of family members of past generations. And so it is for the assisano wood-carver, Rossano Rondoni, great-grandson of Domenico, art…
Aspiring to write a few notes linking ancient Assisi artisan treasures to present artisan wonders, I decided that there would be no better place to start than right in the center of…
In Deruta, a sacred spot of the Middle Ages holds sacred treasures. In this small Umbria hilltown, a 14th-century Franciscan monastery now houses the first ceramics museum of Italy – founded in…
We’re all so overwhelmed always by the innumerable art treasures ready to welcome us in magnificent churches, famous museums and in many a small chapel down side streets in medieval towns. But…